Superb Independent article. When I tell my friends about how MMT they don't usually say much and seem to agree, but I suspect they're wondering what the hell am I talking about. I will be able to send them this short, concise article.

“It diagnoses that neoliberalism was not just a right-wing Thatcherite-Reaganite prospectus. The centre-left, as embodied by Mitterrand’s socialists in France, Blair’s New Labour and the Democratic Party in the US, was complicit in its imposition”

Talk about conspiracy theories there you go right there....

Might as well bring in any other conspiracy theories out there too....

“They’re not stupid and unqualified! It’s all a vast neo-liberal conspiracy!”

And this BS here:

“Here is where quantitative easing (QE) comes in. QE was intended to stimulate bank lending in the aftermath of the financial crisis. However, growth levels have remained stagnant in Britain and Europe. In reality, the banks simply said thank you for the free lunch and used QE to restore their balance sheets. Studies have shown that much of QE ended up contributing to stock market and property bubbles.”

This is ALL falsifiable.... and we’re going to get to see if this is true or not over the short term as these QE policies are reversed... if we don’t get a “burst in the bubble!” as “the Fed takes away the punch bowl!” then this BS conspiracy theory will be proven 100% false...

I read an excellent article about pensions in the Guardian many years ago but I can't find it now on the net. It may have been written by Alex Brummer. He said that the pensions industry was investing only in mortgages because as it fueled booms in house prices the pension fund managers made big bonuses, but when the busts came they kept their money. He argued that instead of funding house price booms the pension fund managers should have funded new industries and businesses which would have created good jobs for young people and excellent pensions for people when they retire. What a tragedy. Mind you, things for even worse when Gordon Brown scrapped the pension tax credit scheme.

well over here Kaivey we had the OFHEO people keep on raising the ceiling of the conforming loan limits all the way up to $417k...

iirc they were about $200k coming out of the dotcom thing and into start of the GWOT then eventually by 2007/2008 they maxed out at $417k and have stayed there until this year iirc they raised them this year to $424k so ofc we see housing prices go up this year a bit...

Most pension fund $ are in govt bonds... some small % in equities/corp bonds....

“It diagnoses that neoliberalism was not just a right-wing Thatcherite-Reaganite prospectus. The centre-left, as embodied by Mitterrand’s socialists in France, Blair’s New Labour and the Democratic Party in the US, was complicit in its imposition”

Matt Franko:Talk about conspiracy theories there you go right there....

What conspiracy theory? This is just history that people who lived through it remember, for which the documentation is enormous and public. Who disputes these facts? E. g. The Dems in the US were the first ones to deficit-terrorize in the last few decades, to play games with the debt limit, against Reagan. Calling this undisputed history a conspiracy theory is like saying that the idea that US presidential elections are held in years divisible by 4 is a "conspiracy theory."

I do agree with Neil that we could do with less of things not directly related to economics, or at least fewer individual posts with more links and text in each. The sheer number of main posts makes it hard to follow at least for me.

I do try to group to some degree but I pick up these links on the fly and just put up what I think is most relevant. So grouping is seldom done all at the same time and early reader will likely miss links that are posted subsequently if they don't check back since I don't post alerts to updates in the comments, which would show up for those that monitor the comments feed, too.

As readers have probably figured, I use an RSS feed reader (I like Feedly), so posting is based not only on the feed but also how often I check it.

To answer the question: "What is the problem in the Eurozone?" they are saying "Thatcherism!" or wtf ... its stupid and not edifying... its a statement that has to be made by someone unqualified/incompetent in material systems...

Yes we have implemented policies that one may create a figure of speech "neoliberal!" to identify, but that doesnt explain anything...

All they are doing is saying that the current policy set is having lacklustre results ... DUH!....

What are they proposing instead now a "Progressive!" policy set? that's just another figure of speech...

Look the right looks at the whole Euro project as a left wing thing in the first place... the US right would point to a brexited UK or a Poland for an example of what to do...

the left (as usual) has failed in the EZ now the left wants to say that the Euro lefties are really not lefty in some sort of psychological coping mechanism...

the left is simply unfit for positions of material systems rule they are materially incompetent they dont rigorously train in/study the applicable disciplines... they are all Arts degree people...